Stretch releasing adhesive tapes are useful in a wide variety of assembling, joining, attaching, and mounting applications. Such tapes are well known in the art and are often used, for example, in circumstances in which it is desired to attach an object to another object, and to be able to separate the objects without any lasting visual disfigurement of, or leaving adhesive residue on, either object.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,024,312 to Korpman discloses a highly conformable adhesive tape including a highly extensible and elastic backing film laminated with an adhesive layer. The backing film possesses a lengthwise elongation at break of at least about 200%. The tape is easily stretchable and may be removed from a surface by stretching the tape lengthwise in a direction substantially parallel to the surface.
German Patent No. 33 31 016 discloses a high elasticity, low plasticity adhesive film based on a thermoplastic rubber and tackifying resins, wherein the adhesive bond can be broken by stretching the adhesive film in the direction of the plane of the adhesive bond.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,516,581 to Kreckel et al. discloses a removable adhesive tape having a highly extensible and substantially inelastic backing coated with a layer of pressure sensitive adhesive. The adhesive tape can be removed from a substrate without damaging the substrate by stretching the tape in a direction substantially parallel to the surface of the substrate. The tape backing has a lengthwise elongation at break of from about 150% to about 1200%, a Young's modulus of at least about 2,500 psi to about 72,500 psi, and an elastic recovery of less than about 50% after being stretched and removed.
PCT International Publication No. WO 95/06691 discloses removable foam adhesive tape comprising a backing including a layer of polymeric foam, and a layer of pressure-sensitive adhesive coated on at least one surface of the backing. The foam layer of the backing has a thickness of about 30 to about 1000 mils, and the backing has a lengthwise elongation at break of from about 50% to about 1200%, and a Young's modulus of less than about 2,400 psi.
Conventional use of stretch releasing adhesive tapes may involve the existence of a visible pull tab, as pictured in prior art FIG. 1. Often, the adhesive surface of a particular portion of the stretch releasing adhesive tape is rendered non-adhesive (e.g. by application of a coating, lamination of a film, etc.) so that this portion of the adhesive tape serves as the pull tab.
PCT International Publication No. WO 98/06652 discloses a length cutting fixture which can be used to form a pull tab or “gripper” at the end of a long length of a conventional single-sided adhesive tape. The length cutting fixture also serves to cut the long length of tape, now including the gripper, to any desired length. The gripper is formed by folding the end of the tape back onto itself.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,491,012 to Luhmann et al. discloses a strip of an adhesive film for a re-releasable adhesive bond, one end of the strip being provided on both sides with a UV-opaque covering which at the same time serves as a tab for pulling.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,641,910 to Bries and Johansson discloses a stretch releasing tape that includes a segmented liner that can be used to form a manually engagable pull tab.